Jacqueline Kierans
Ceramics
January 12 - February 6, 2009

Artist's Statement

My approach to making art is informed by the close investigation of my immediate surroundings. I like organizing and try to establish patterns and connections between seemingly disparate elements that I encounter everyday. I am particularly interested in the plants and animals from my garden and the woods near my home. I use drawings and photographs to track the seasonal changes that occur in this intimate landscape. These are the images that inspire my prints and sculptures. Through my artwork I do not intend to enlighten or add to the viewer's knowledge of the world. I attempt to illustrate my reflections on those mundane everyday things that are rarely given attention, but that have caught my eye or piqued my curiosity.

Artist's Background

Jacqueline Kierans has studied art in Dundee, Scotland, Los Angeles, California and in Washington, DC. At the University of California, Los Angeles she had the opportunity to study ceramics with professors John Mason and Adrian Saxe. During her studies at The George Washington University with professor Turker Ozdogan she became interested in how to convert the complex imagery in her drawings and paintings into surface treatments for her functional ceramics and ceramic sculptures.

This is the point at which she became interested in how to use the techniques employed by industrial ceramic manufactures to decorate dinnerware and tiles into a practice that could be employed in an art studio setting. The focus of her thesis work was to develop a mainly water based printing technique to allow her to create complex and repeatable surface decoration for all kinds of ceramic surfaces. Since completing her master’s degree in Ceramics at The George Washington University she now teaches at Marymount University in Arlington, and is an artist in residence at the Lee Center in Arlington.

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